BATON ROUGE - A traffic headache for drivers near LSU will be underway for months.

Nicholson Drive is down from four lanes to two, starting at West Chimes through Burbank. The orange cones are mostly affecting students and business owners.

"I have to leave probably 30 minutes earlier," LSU junior Kendal Wambsgans told WBRZ.

The two southbound lanes are blocked off, making two-way traffic shift to the northbound lanes.

"I usually try to go this way to avoid the traffic," said Wambsgans. "Now I'm having to take a really long route where the traffic is condensed, because the lights are out and everything, too."

The Louisiana Deportment of Transportation and Development spokesman says the lanes are being shifted so crews can do drainage rehab work. It will stay this way until June 15, but that’s only phase one. Phase two will shift the two-way traffic back to the southbound lanes.

"It all floods around here, so it definitely needs to be done, but I'd rather standing water in the street,” said the owner of Voodoo BBQ & Grill, Doug Felton.

Felton's restaurant sits across the street from the roadwork that is creating bumper-to-bumper traffic. Felton says the extra cars are hindering his business.

"In all honesty, I'm anticipating at least a 20 percent decrease [in customers]," said Felton. "They come in and are like wow, it took us forever to get here. So we might get them the first couple of times, but as time goes on, the impact will be greater and greater."

Including phase two of the project, the lane shifts will continue through August. DOTD says this will give crews enough time to finish before school starts back up again in the fall.